The Role of Public Trust and Media in Managing the Dissemination of COVID-19-Related News in Switzerland

Abstract

Public trust in health information is essential to ensure that preventative strategies to reduce the transmission of COVID-19 are accepted and followed. This study explored the way Swiss people accessed and consumed news and information about the coronavirus from different channels, and the role media plays in public trust during the pandemic. Based on a study of 442 randomly assigned participants in French-speaking regions, we examined the following four questions: (1) What are the news sources and platforms and how are they used? (2) How does the public rate the trustworthiness of these sources and platforms? (3) To what extent does the public perceive that these sources and platforms are provided inaccurate information? (4) What roles do these sources and platforms play in the pandemic? Implications are discussed in the conclusion based on our findings.